Harris snaps up Imagine; aims for MSO market

Harris Broadcast has purchased Imagine Communications, picking up Imagine’s transcoding and video processing products, as well as a potential entry into the cable and IPTV video distributors, markets that will be largely new to Harris.

Vogt spoke highly of Imagine’s adaptive bit-rate (ABR) technology and its dense transcoder, called “Next”, which he said is concluding trials with several MSOs.

The Next Dense Transcoder can deliver any resolution up to 1080p60, the company said, and support up to 320 HD or 640 SD multiscreen profiles per server. It consumes less than 2 watts per stream and has 100 percent system redundancy. With the next: v1.1 SW upgrade, service providers can now deploy a single 2U server that not only transcodes, packages and encrypts hundreds of multiscreen services, but also stores those programs for 7 days of Catch-Up TV and also acts as an origin server.

The transcode is essentially a software-based approach, though implemented in a custom chipset, and running in what Harris characterized as a virtualized blade server environment.

Harris has its own transcoder, called Selenio. It is a hardware-based implementation, which Harris has been selling largely to broadcast and programming customers.

Vogt noted that Harris Broadcast’s long-term vision for product development is focused on software and commercial-off-the-shelf hardware, and Imagine’s approach fits that model. He said Imagine’s chipset has price/power/performance advantages, and that Harris intends to incorporate Imagine technology in its own product line, with the resulting products to be called Selenio Next.

Neither Harris nor Imagine is currently deeply involved in cloud-based ABR video delivery, but Vogt said Harris is “definitely looking at that.”